A proposed land-use change has Palm Beach County planners fearing that development will spread rapidly through the area’s sugar cane fields.
Palm Beach Aggregates, also known as PBA Holdings, wants a limited land-use change to allow for industrial development on part of its property west of Wellington. PBA Holdings says it wants to create jobs in western Palm Beach County.
Ten years ago, planners drew a dividing line — the L-8 canal, about halfway between the ocean and Lake Okeechobee to an area north of Southern Boulevard — that was supposed to curb westward expansion of homes and other urban development as well as the encroachment on the Everglades Agricultural area around the lake.
PBA Holdings wants to build an industrial development west of the canal on 142 acres the company owns, north of Southern Boulevard. The county’s planners have recommended that the proposal be denied, stating it would jeopardize protecting western rural farmland. [Palm Beach Post] — Claire Moses